'Star Wars' baby names? This mom went for it because there's always another Jacob out there

Huge Star Wars fans Nicole Stewart and her husband, Andrew, named their son, who was born on May 4, 2018, Lucas Skywalker.
Cheryl Evans, The Republic | azcentral.com

Not long ago in a galaxy just off Loop 101 in Chandler, a baby was born. He was not unlike other babies born in the same place or even on the same day, May 4.

Except for his name. Lucas Skywalker Stewart. It was his destiny.

His parents are huge fans of "Star Wars" and his birthday is significant among "Star Wars" fans. May 4. May the Fourth. As in, "May the Force be with you," one of the most iconic lines to come out of the "Star Wars" movies.

Thus it was that new baby Stewart was given the name of Luke Skywalker, the young dreamer who introduced the universe to a generation of space adventures.

Nicole Stewart and her husband , Andrew, share their love for Star Wars and Disney with their children, Elliott, 2, and 6-day-old son, Lucas Skywalker Stewart. Lucas was born on May 4.(Photo: Cheryl Evans/The Republic)

The name would have gone to Lucas' older brother, who’s 2 years old now, had he arrived on May 4. But Elliott Rider Stewart was born a day too early, on May 3.

So it was left to his baby brother to assume the mantle.

Choosing a name for a child is a big deal, the first public parenting decision moms and dads make. In past generations, parents tended to pick names that would help their children fit in. Today’s moms and dads want something different.

“You’re going to stand out,” Nicole Stewart said to her new son, looking at his little face. “I can’t believe anyone else is going to have that name.”

Lucas Skywalker seemed content with it, snuggled in his mother’s arms and wearing a black onesie that says, “Baby Skywalker” on the front.

It's a new hope

Nicole Stewart holds her 6-day-old son, Lucas Skywalker Stewart in Chandler home on May 10, 2018. Lucas was born on May 4 to huge Star Wars fan parents.(Photo: Cheryl Evans/The Republic)

In the "Star Wars" universe, Luke Skywalker was a Tatooine farm boy who became a great Jedi and battled the evil Empire, with a little help from his twin sister, Princess Leia Organa, roguish friend Han Solo and a smattering of rebels.

The parents of this Luke Skywalker are big "Star Wars" fans, going back to when they were kids, long before the franchise was bought by Disney.

Andrew Stewart watched the original trilogy on VHS tapes and battled with his cousins with light sabers fashioned from sticks.

Nicole got the first of what would be a lifelong supply of Star Wars T-shirts when she was 10.

"Star Wars" is a story for the ages, a tale of heroism, overcoming the odds, and the lengths we’ll go to protect the ones we love, Nicole, 34, said. It’s about fighting for what's right. It's about hope.

And it was unlike anything they’d seen before — the soaring music, the awesome space ships, one fantastic creature after another, the epic light saber battles, a princess who didn’t need protecting.

Andrew Stewart and his wife, Nicole, are huge Star Wars fans so it is not a surprise that their son Lucas Skywalker Stewart's nursery is decorated as such. Lucas was born on May 4. Cheryl Evans/The Republic

Nicole Stewart and her husband , Andrew, share their love for Star Wars and Disney with their children, Elliott, 2, and 6-day-old son, Lucas Skywalker Stewart. Lucas was born on May 4. Cheryl Evans/The Republic

Nicole Stewart and her husband , Andrew, share their love for Star Wars and Disney with their children, Elliott, 2, and 6-day-old son, Lucas Skywalker Stewart. Lucas was born on May 4. Cheryl Evans/The Republic

Elliott Stewart, 2, plays in his brother's nursery in their Chandler home on May 10, 2018. Stewart's parents are huge Star Wars fan and named their 6-day-old Lucas Skywalker Stewart who by the way was born on May the 4th. Cheryl Evans/The Republic

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Even before Disney bought Lucasfilm in 2012, giving it ownership of the "Star Wars" franchise, Nicole and Andrew had loved all things Disney.

Their wedding was Disney-themed, the invitations dotted with Mickey Mouse and Tinkerbell and pictures of the two of them at Disneyland featured as the centerpiece on each table.

Nicole walked down the aisle to an instrumental version of "When You Wish Upon a Star."

Nicole and Andrew ran in a "Star Wars" 10K at Disneyland dressed as Princess Leia and Han Solo. Elliott, who was 1 at the time, did the diaper-dash in a Yoda costume.

In their house, on the wall at the top of the stairs, are framed pictures, one of Princess Leia’s silhouette with the words, “I love you” underneath, the other of Han Solo over the words, “I know,” playing out the famous scene in "The Empire Strikes Back" when Leia and Han confess their feelings for each other.

They have matching T-shirts that say the same thing, and it is on key chains Nicole bought this year for their anniversary.

When they found out in January they were having another boy, and with a due date of May 7, Nicole thought, “Maybe this will be our little Jedi.”

She had had a Cesarean section with Elliott, and her doctor recommended she have one with this baby, too. Nicole asked if she could schedule it for May 4. Her doctor agreed.

Nicole put her feet up and avoided spicy foods so the baby wouldn’t come early.

Elliott Stewart, 2, plays in his brother's nursery in their Chandler home on May 10, 2018. Stewart's parents are huge Star Wars fan and named their 6-day-old Lucas Skywalker Stewart who by the way was born on May the 4th.(Photo: Cheryl Evans/The Republic)

From a certain point of view

I like the name.

A disclaimer: My son Sawyer was 4½ the first time I put "Star Wars" in the DVD player, and I bought him his first light saber, blue like Luke Skywalker's.

On the first day of kindergarten, when Sawyer hesitated at the classroom door, I said softly, "Use the Force, Sawyer."

When he was 7, Sawyer wore brown Jedi robes every day for about a year, even to have his picture taken with Santa Claus.

We named our dog after an Ewok.

A second disclaimer: I like unusual names. We have plenty in our family: Serena and Terena, Levi, Zebedee and Mungo. Willow. Shantel and Chantel, one on each side of the family.

When Jim and I were choosing a name for our baby, we turned not to Bruce Lansky's "The Best Baby Name Book in the Whole Wide World," but to the dictionary.

Sawyer has three half-siblings — Sonnet, Sky and Savannah. Each name is an actual word, not a name like Sam or Sarah. We wanted the same for this baby.

The list is still there in my Random House College Dictionary with the red cover — 22 possibilities neatly printed in purple pencil on the back of a sheet of paper shaped like a cluster of grapes: Street, South, Story, Satchel, Sargent, Sailor, Sage, Saracen.

(We didn't consider Saint, the name Kim Kardashian and Kanye West chose for their son in 2015. It seemed a lot to put on a kid.)

We had narrowed it down to a handful — Storm, Sawyer, Story, Scout, Scarlet — when we first saw him on an ultrasound. A boy. He was instantly Sawyer, one fist raised above his head, all boyhood and adventure.

Granted, Sawyer wasn't high on the Social Security Administration's annual list of popular baby names in 1999. It ranked 480th.

That made me like it even more.

No. 1 that year was Jacob, and Sawyer would become friends with three of them by kindergarten, distinguishing one from the other with the first letter of their last names: Jacob D., Jacob N., Jacob R. (Even Jacob D's mother called him "Jacob D.")

But Sawyer went to school with a lot of kids with unusual names. "Who," I asked my brother, “is going to beat him up?" Parker? Kyren? Hunter? Ryder?

Maybe Anakin?

The return of Jedi ... and Leia and Kylo

Andrew Stewart and his wife, Nicole, are huge Star Wars fans so it is not a surprise that their son Lucas Skywalker Stewart's nursery is decorated as such. Lucas was born on May 4.(Photo: Cheryl Evans/The Republic)

"Star Wars" fans have been naming their kids Luke and Leia since the Death Star exploded in 1977.

As the movie franchise expanded so did the options for parents who were "Star Wars" fans, according to Social Security Administration records.

After “Star Wars: Episode I: The Phantom Menace” hit theaters in 1999, 114 baby boys were named Anakin, the character who would grow up to be Darth Vader, up from 26 the year before.

Kylo was the fastest-growing baby name for boys in 2016 — 238 of them (and seven girls) — following the introduction of Kylo Ren in the 2015 movie “Star Wars: The Force Awakens.”

That same year, there were 1,005 girls named Leia, 303 boys and seven girls named Anakin, 254 boys and 63 girls named Rey, a new character in the franchise, and 32 boys named Jedi, which wasn't even a person's name in the movies.

At the same time, BabyCenter.com, a popular parenting site, officially called "Star Wars" baby names a "huge, hot trend," with Rey ranked 2,784, up from 14,172 in 2015, and Rogue — from the title of 'Rogue One: A Star Wars Story" — ranked 2,089, up from 5,522 the previous year.

She loves it, you know

Nicole is a fifth-grade teacher at Hartford Sylvia Encinas Elementary School in Chandler so she has seen a lot of unusual names on her rosters over the years: Myking. Aqueen and even a girl named Johncena (all one word), after professional wrestler John Cena.

A fellow teacher had a boy named Lemonjello, pronounced “lee-mon-gel-o.” (It’s all his mom wanted to eat when she was pregnant.)

So you’ll get no judgement from her. “Everybody has to do what they like and what works for them,” Nicole said. “Whatever makes your kid stand out.”

There were always at least three girls named Nicole in every one of her classes growing up. There’s another Andrew Stewart at Andrew’s office — he has to use his middle initial to differentiate his emails.

Lucas Skywalker will only seem unusual if he says his first and middle name together, Nicole said. Luke Stewart is pretty standard fare.

She imagines teachers picking him for their classes based on his name and future employers calling him in for an interview, even if just to hear his story. It will be a fun talking point for him.

The sign on his nursery door says “Lucas’ Galaxy,” and there’s a rug on the floor in the shape of the Millennium Falcon, Han Solo's famous ship. All around the ceiling, the walls are dotted with stars, TIE fighters, X-Wings and even a Death Star in the corner.

On one wall, between two windows, it says “Truly wonderful the mind of a child is — Master Jedi Yoda.” Over the crib, it says, “The Force is strong with this one — Master Jedi Yoda.”

There’s a laundry basket in the shape of R2-D2, shelves of Star Wars books and a teddy bear in Jedi robes with a light-up blue light saber.

On a recent morning, his brother was wearing a tie-dye T-shirt that said, “I am a Jedi like my father before me.” Andrew was wearing a Star Wars T-shirt, too. It said, "Daddy, You're as strong as a Wookiee, as daring as Han Solo, as wise as Yoda and as brave as Skywalker." Nicole isn’t wearing one, but she has plenty.

The Force is strong in this family

“I think if you can show them this world that is make-believe and awesome," where there are other worlds in a galaxy far, far away and toys come to life when no one is looking, Nicole said, "it can spark their imagination.”

Elliott is named after the dragon in the Disney movie “Pete’s Dragon.” His middle name, Rider, is from Flynn Rider, the prince from Disney’s “Tangled.”

“It had to be Disney,” Andrew said, laughing. “I didn’t get much say in it.”

But Elliott’s name suits him, Andrew said. He’s sweet and a little wild like Elliott the dragon. Like a prince, he’s gallant (mostly so; he likes a hand to hold on the stairs) and adventurous.

Elliott put on a Darth Vader helmet and marched in place. He gave it to his dad to take a turn. "I am your father,” Andrew told him in a husky voice. In Nicole's arms, baby Lucas Skywalker suddenly smiled.

Andrew expects his new son will be like the character Luke Skywalker.

“He’s the good guy. He has a kind heart,” he said. And then he paused and added, “He did technically kill his father…” Hopefully, it won’t come to that.

Nicole imagines with the name Lucas Skywalker, her son will fight for what’s right and never give up. “I’m hoping that’s the kind of person he will be,” she said.

Regardless of the expectations that come with a name, once you name your child, the name becomes theirs, no matter who had it before, Andrew said.

“It’s one of those names you can embrace and make it awesome," Andrew said. "You can define it, or it will define you.”